William Blake and the Age of Aquarius

by Stephen F. Eisenman, Mark Crosby (Contribution by), Elizabeth Ferrell (Contribution by), Jacob Henry Leveton (Contribution by), W.J.T. Mitchell (Contribution by)

Overview

A stunningly illustrated look at how Blake's radical vision influenced artists of the Beat generation and 1960s counterculture

In his own lifetime, William Blake (1757–1827) was a relatively unknown nonconventional artist with a strong political bent. William Blake and the Age of Aquarius is a beautifully illustrated look at how, some two hundred years after his birth, the antiestablishment values embodied in Blake’s art and poetry became a model for artists of the American counterculture.

This book provides new insights into the politics and protests of Blake’s own lifetime, and the generation of artists who revived and reimagined his work in the mid-1940s through 1970, or what might be called the “long sixties.” Contributors explore Blake’s outsider status in Georgian England and how his individualistic vision spoke to members of the Beat Generation, hippies, radical poets and writers, and other voices of the counterculture. Among the artists, musicians, and writers who looked to Blake were such diverse figures as Diane Arbus, Jay DeFeo, the Doors, Sam Francis, Allen Ginsberg, Jess, Agnes Martin, Ad Reinhardt, Charles Seliger, Maurice Sendak, Robert Smithson, Clyfford Still, and many others. This book also explores visual cultures around such galvanizing moments of the 1960s as Woodstock and the Summer of Love.

William Blake and the Age of Aquarius shows how Blake’s myths, visions, and radicalism found new life among American artists who valued individualism and creativity, explored expanded consciousness, and celebrated youth, peace, and the power of love in a turbulent age.

Exhibition schedule:
Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art, Northwestern University
September 23, 2017–March 11, 2018

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780691175256
Publisher:	Princeton University Press
Publication date:	10/17/2017
Pages:	248
Product dimensions:	8.20(w) x 10.30(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Stephen F. Eisenman is professor of art history at Northwestern University. Mark Crosby is assistant professor of English at Kansas State University. Elizabeth Ferrell is assistant professor of art history at Arcadia University. Jacob Henry Leveton is a PhD candidate in art history at Northwestern. W.J.T. Mitchell is the Gaylord Donnelley Distinguished Service Professor of English and Art History at the University of Chicago. John P. Murphy is research associate in the Department of American Art at the Art Institute of Chicago.

Table of Contents

Director’s Foreword vii

Lisa G Corrin

Acknowledgments viii

Corinne Granof

William Blake and the Age of Aquarius 1

Stephen F Eisenman

Prophets, Madmen, and Millenarians 79

Mark Crosby

William Blake on the West Coast 101

Elizabeth Ferrell

William Blake and Art against Surveillance 141

Jacob Henry Leveton

Building Golgonooza in the Age of Aquarius 161

John P Murphy

Sendak, Blake, and the Image of Childhood 183

Mark Crosby

Blake Now and Then 199

WJT Mitchell

Notes 206

Contributors 223

Index 224

Credits 231

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"A timely book that provides fresh perspective on the art of the 1960s. Much as it did for the artists and activists of the Beat and hippie generations, Blake's visionary antiestablishment thought and work can perhaps again offer a reference point for those today who are struggling to produce an artistic response appropriate to the new century's demands."—Michael Archer, author of Art Since 1960

"This is a jewel of a book. It revisits the searing and soaring works of Blake through their reincarnation in the 1960s counterculture, deepening the understanding of both."—Daniel Herwitz, author of The Star as Icon: Celebrity in the Age of Mass Consumption

Editorial Reviews

"One of the The New York Times Best Art Books of 2017, chosen by Holland Cotter"

Honorable Mention for the 2018 PROSE Award in Art Exhibitions, Association of American Publishers

From the Publisher

12/01/2017
Although barely known in his lifetime, William Blake (1757–1827) became a cult hero in the 1950s as poet, artist, visionary, and antiestablishment iconoclast. His work has resonated with artists as diverse as Jimi Hendrix and the Doors, Beat poet Allen Ginsberg, photographer Diane Arbus, and children's author/illustrator Maurice Sendak. This book is companion to the exhibition at the Block Museum of Art (Northwestern Univ.) and draws on collections from that institution as well as rare materials from the Rosenbach (Philadelphia) and the Yale Center for British Art. Curator and author Eisenman, (art history, Northwestern Univ.) has written a thoroughly referenced overview of Blake's biography and work. Seven contributing scholars focus on topics such as Blake's uptake by hippies in 1967's Summer of Love. The work's many illustrations demonstrate the wide influence of Blake's use of both image and text, from the abstract expressionists' employment of color field to the themes in Sendak's picture books to psychedelic concert posters. VERDICT A scholar's exploration of artistic connections between American artists and the eccentric Blake.—Nancy B. Turner, Temple Univ. Lib., Philadelphia

Library Journal